Sunday, April 13, 2003

A couple of notes from last week that I neglected to mention are both discussed in this here article

....concerning the Archbishop of San Antonio, who ordered a priest to put that US flag back up where he says it belongs:

Archbishop Patrick Flores issued his order after receiving inquiries about what some Our Lady of Grace congregants say the Rev. John Mannion's latest display of anti-United States sentiment. Church members say that Mannion often criticized America during sermons and kept the flag at half-staff. Last week, he simply removed it from the church in La Coste, 20 miles southwest of San Antonio. ''I have advised Father Mannion that the American flag must be restored at full height to its usual place of honor immediately,'' Flores said Thursday.

...and the Archbishop of Portland, Oregon, who fired his Justice and Peace director:

Earlier this week, the Portland, Ore., archdiocese fired its 12-year peace and justice director after repeatedly warning the man to curtail his anti-war activism. An archdiocese spokesman said Frank Fromherz was laid off because of budget cuts. But Fromherz, 49, said archdiocese officials told him he was fired because he violated his role as an ''agent'' for the archbishop and his views. Fromherz had clashed with Archbishop John G. Vlazny over the war. For example, Fromherz sent an e-mail to hundreds of Catholics and others that encouraged anti-war protests and called on ''the international criminal court to indict and prosecute our own President (Bush) as a war criminal.''

So..bring it all together for us...the Pope opposed to the war, the church employees speaking against the war in..er...vivid terms, the bishops telling them to stop, the military personnel listening to the Passion in Baghdad, being told to liken themselves to the suffering Christ, and the Iraqi Christians, glad that God has answered their prayers for an end to the bombing...(blogged below)